The Appearance of Favoritism
by hufflelit
Summary: A series of short one-shots focusing on the Spock/Uhura pairing, both pre- and post-film.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Let me first say that I have been so thrilled and touched by the lovely reviews for my two Spock/Uhura one-shots. You guys are awesome! I wish I were actively writing Trek fic right now, but I do have a few things stored away that I've decided to post here. These are a series of one-shot prompt responses I wrote for a challenge at LJ's spock_uhura comm (definitely worth a look, if this is your pairing). I'll put them all up over the next few weeks, and I hope you enjoy them.

To my gorgeous reviewers, this is for you.

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><p>Homesick<p>

It was 11:32 on a Wednesday morning when Cadet Nyota Uhura realized that she had completely unprofessional feelings for Commander Spock.

Two weeks earlier, she had gone to his office to drop off a PADD of graded papers for his Klingon Phonics class. It had been 7:53 on a Monday evening, and she was cold and cranky.

It was mid-December, and although she'd lived away from home for years, this was always the time of year that made her miss Mvita most, the time when she'd been away from it the longest, the time when she felt almost sick for want of the scorching heat, the cool salt air off the ocean, the white sand beaches and the white, pebble-dashed high-rises that abutted them. She missed speaking Swahili to people who could understand her, missed hearing multiple languages in one street, missed street venders selling cherry Ice Planets, and the sounds of old-style Bhangra and hip-hop floating down the whitewashed, balcony-lined alleys of the Classic Sector. And she definitely missed wearing something other than a regulation miniskirt and red turtleneck all the time.

Nyota was used to missing Mvita, however, and she could put it aside. She brought it out when she spoke to her parents and sister once every two weeks, and could see the ocean out the window opposite their communicator. Beyond those moments, bouts of homesickness were easily manageable, especially with her intense third-year schedule. There were about thirty other African students at the Academy, and they would all shake their heads and complain about the cold or the rain or the lousy beaches when they passed each other on campus, but the bottom line was: Nyota was exactly where she wanted to be. Most of the time.

As she'd stepped into Commander Spock's office that evening, however, a wave of dry heat had hit her, warming her to the bone, loosening muscles that had grown stiff in San Francisco's damp winter chill, and she missed Mvita like a tug on her heart.

She had been unable to resist an audible sigh of relief. "Finally, a room that's a decent temperature," she had said, smiling at the Commander as she placed the PADD on his desk.

"The graded Phonics papers," she'd explained.

He gave her his by-now-familiar curt nod. "Thank you, Cadet. Your efficiency is appreciated."

She'd smiled to acknowledge the compliment, saluted, and turned to go, perhaps with less of an attempt at conversation than she would have made if she hadn't found the Commander so unnervingly attractive.

"I take it that you find the recent temperatures below your standards?" his voice said from behind her, and she had turned back with a surprised smile.

It wasn't flirting, but it was talking. That was nice. And new.

"Far below them, Commander," she said with a grin. "Your office is very comfortable, though. Vulcan is much warmer than San Francisco, isn't it?"

"Much," he had agreed. "Vulcan's weather is rather close, I believe, to that of your home region."

She had blinked at him, momentarily surprised into silence. He knew where she was from?

"Yes," she'd said quickly, recovering with another smile. Of course he knew where she was from; it was in her file. Which, of course, he had read.

"Do you miss Vulcan, Sir?" she had asked, unsure exactly how the conversation was meant to proceed.

He raised an eyebrow at her, but appeared to consider the question.

"Vulcan and Earth have many differing, yet favorable, elements," he answered after a moment; a non-answer that seemed to her to be a very clear answer, meaning, "yes, frequently." She wondered what he would think of her mentally translating his Vulcan English into Human English.

"I feel the same way about Mvita and San Francisco," she had said, hoping that her translations of his emotions were accurate.

He had nodded silently, his head and eyebrow cocked slightly as if considering her. It was a dismissal, but not, she thought, of their conversation, or of her.

"Have a pleasant evening, Commander," she had said, saluting again before moving to the door. As an afterthought, she looked over her shoulder and added, "Stay warm."

She had recalled their conversation a few times during the following weeks, mentally cataloguing his face, his way of speaking, his look when considering her, during the moments before she fell asleep. It wasn't a crush, exactly. More a fascination, mingled with a significant amount of attraction.

Then, at 11:32 on a Wednesday morning, she walked into his lecture room and he looked up at her from his PADD and said, in perfect Swahili, "_Habari ya asubuhi_" – good morning.

"_You speak Swahili?_" she asked in the same language, delighted.

He smiled slightly and shook his head, seeming almost awkward. "_A little._"

She stood there grinning at him in happy surprise as the rest of the class filed in behind her.

"_Luga moja haitoshi_," he added: _one language is never enough_.

His tone and demeanor had returned to their usual rigidity, but then he raised an eyebrow at her, and it seemed almost like an invitation to speak freely to him, without reference to protocol or rank. Nyota realized that, although they had been alone together before, this conversation, in the middle of an increasingly crowded lecture hall, felt like the most private interaction they had ever had.

"_I agree completely_," she said, and he almost smiled again.

She moved to take her seat in the front row, still grinning uncontrollably in spite of the nervous throbbing in her stomach and the worrying realization that her position as Commander Spock's aide had just become incredibly complicated.

It was not until later that she realized he had learned Swahili only to speak to her.

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><p><strong>AN:** Thanks for reading! As always, I love to know what you think.


	2. Chapter 2

Alcohol

Gaila and Uhura had been living together for less than two weeks when their game began.

It originally started because Uhura couldn't resist sharing interesting facts from her assigned reading. Pleased by the opportunity for conversation, Gaila had reciprocated with her own, generally extracurricular, information.

"Did you know that the Bajoran symbol for 'fetus' is almost identical to the symbol for 'lower ventricle of the heart,' because both are considered equally delicate and precious?"

"Did _you_ know that a small minority of Bajoran women can bend their knees backwards?"

Uhura's head shot up.

"That's not true."

Gaila, who had been sprawled across her bed, reviewing a code for her Network Security class, had shrugged. "Prove me wrong."

Uhura had tried. She had searched every Bajoran biology text in the Academy's system, and some outside of it, and had eventually discovered that, yes, a small but constant minority of Bajoran women _could_ bend their knees backwards. She had brought it up in her Xenobiology class the following week, even managing to stump her professor. She had never underestimated Gaila again.

Within another two weeks, Gaila had introduced alcohol into the game.

"It'll be fun! Listen: if one of us gives a fact and the other one can't come up with something on the same topic, she has to take a shot."

Uhura had hesitated at first, but they hardly ever stumped each other, and a shot of Jack's couldn't damage her reading-comprehension too badly.

"You know Romulans are an offshoot of Vulcans, right? Well, when they left Vulcan, they wanted to change their language, so they reverted to Old High Vulcan, and now they say that they spoke the language first, and that the Vulcans are their descendents."

"Really." Gaila narrowed her eyes and smiled. "Who told you that?"

Uhura arched an eyebrow. "Do you have a response, or are you going to take a shot?"

"No, I have a response. Was it that sexy Vulcan professor?"

"Gaila!" Uhura tossed a pillow at her roommate to hide the fact that she was blushing. "You can't talk about Commander Spock that way; he's our superior."

"Superiors can't be sexy?" Gaila teased, tossing the pillow back. "If that were true, we Orions wouldn't get _anything_ done."

"You know what I mean. Anyway, what's your fact?" This round had taken an unexpected turn, and Uhura really wanted to get back to her reading before all future productivity was spoiled by the words "Commander Spock" and "sexy" swirling around in her head.

"So you don't think he's attractive?" Gaila pressed, still grinning and looking far too perceptive.

"Gaila, no, he's… Just, no."

"Convincing."

"I'm going to throw the Jack's bottle at you next. What's your fact?"

Gaila eyed her a moment longer, a smile lingering on her face. At last, she replied.

"Vulcan males are immune to the pheromones of Orion females."

"I knew that," Uhura said, not quite able to keep a hint of smugness out of her voice. She told herself she was only pleased by her own knowledge of Xenobiology, and not for any other, more personal, reason.

Gaila was still watching her, almost biting her lips to keep from grinning.

"But every seven years, Vulcan males experience this intense need to mate. All their repressed emotions just boil over, and they can't contain themselves – they have to have hours and hours of passionate sex just to burn off the frenetic energy of all the tension that builds up over years of sexual repression. It's incredibly primal. And pretty kinky, don't you think?"

Uhura noticed that her mouth was unaccountably dry.

"That's ridiculous," she said, but the statement came out like a question.

"It's called _pon farr_," Gaila said, affecting disinterest as she examined her nails. "Most non-Vulcans don't know about it. Vulcans are ashamed to talk about it because they're so repressed. Mostly they go back to Vulcan when it happens and get married and, I don't know, lock themselves up with their new wives and just have sex constantly until it passes. Vulcan males are susceptible to Orion pheromones during _pon farr_. Although," she appeared to consider, "they'll probably just have sex with the first female that gets in their way, whether she's Orion, Vulcan, Romulan… Human."

She widened her eyes at Uhura. "Hey! I wonder when Commander Spock's _pon farr_ is!"

Uhura, who had already started to wonder herself, was too distracted to reprimand her roommate for disrespecting a commanding officer.

She swallowed, but her mouth and throat were still too dry, and her face was too hot.

"What are you doing?" Gaila asked, furrowing her brow. "You didn't lose; you don't have to take a shot."

Uhura screwed the top back on the bottle of Jack's and let out a deep breath.

"Yes, I really do."

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><p><strong>AN:** Thank you for all your wonderful reviews! I look forward to hearing what you think of this one.


	3. Chapter 3

Danger

Uhura was the first one to notice the enormous, arachnid-like creature on the side of a nearby tree, causing her to let out an involuntary yelp of horror.

She was standing behind Spock less than a second later, before Kirk and McCoy even had their phasers out.

"What is it?" Kirk demanded, body tensed, phaser cocked, staring into the dense vegetation for any sign of danger.

The creature hadn't moved, except to crouch closer to the cracked, gray tree trunk that almost camouflaged it.

Uhura, her face hot with shame at her own cowardice, stepped out from behind Spock. They'd had the Enterprise for a month and a half. This was her first away mission. And she had screamed like a child and hidden behind her boyfriend.

"I'm sorry, Captain. I overreacted. I was startled by that."

She pointed, and received immediate vindication.

"Sweet Mother of Jesus!" Dr. McCoy barked, jumping away from the creature. Kirk flinched back as well, emitting a low, guttural whine of masculine disgust.

Spock cocked an eyebrow at his Human companions.

"Fascinating," he pronounced, with a hint of smugness that Uhura was sure only she could detect.

He took a step forward, away from the other three, and directed his scanner toward the creature. Uhura forced herself to move to his side and examine the thing for herself.

It had nine legs, each about half a meter in length, which were ranged at regular intervals around a roughly cylindrical body. The body itself was about the same size as that of a large cat, and was mottled gray. She saw that one of the creature's legs, which extended over the side of the trunk, was the same bluish-green as the foliage behind it. It had a wide, oval mouth, which was contracting and expanding at irregular intervals.

Uhura narrowed her eyes and tilted her right ear towards the creature. Slowly, she managed to distinguish a low croaking and soft clicking, which she had previously filtered out as white noise of the surrounding jungle.

"I think it might be talking to us," she said after a moment, glancing at Spock.

"Seriously?" Kirk asked, lowering his phaser and coming to stand on the other side of Spock. He glanced at the readout on Spock's scanner, which was showing the vibrations of the creature's noises. It seemed to be repeating the same series of sounds over and over again.

"Do you think it likes us?"

The croaking became more insistent, and sharp, red tusks started to descend from the roof of its mouth.

"I think not," Spock said quickly, but Kirk was already speaking into his comm unit, and Uhura could feel the slight tingling sensation of teleportation before the creature had even tensed to leap.

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><p>An hour later, after they had given their reports, after Kirk and Spock had had another argument about the wisdom of the captain <em>and<em> the first officer going on potentially hazardous away missions, and after McCoy had returned to Sickbay to analyze the records from Spock's scanner, Uhura took Spock aside.

"Spock, I am… so sorry that I jumped behind you down there," she said, her face impassive for the benefit of the crewmembers passing them in the corridor. "It was a stupid impulse, and I hope you know that, in the presence of danger, I would do everything in my power to protect you." She grimaced. "Even though I didn't."

"Nyota," he cut her off before she could continue. "You did not move behind me; I moved in front of you."

She blinked at him, her impassive expression faltering.

"Oh."

She wasn't sure whether to be touched or irritated. She wanted to feel touched, however, and couldn't restrain a smile.

"I do apologize," Spock said, although he didn't sound overly apologetic. "It was a foolish impulse. In the presence of danger, I believe that you would be perfectly capable of protecting yourself. And, if necessary, me."

She grinned at him. "Well, as it was an impulse, I don't think I could be angry. But don't let it happen again."

His mouth quirked into a smile.

"I would not dream of it."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:** Thank you all so much for the lovely reviews! Special thanks to LydiaMoon for your thoughtful concrit - it's very helpful, and very appreciated. I really like writing Academy-era fic, and if I ever do write a longer piece for this fandom (as I hope I will), it will probably be in that timeline. The rest of the prompt pieces I have are post-Academy, and kind of wide-ranging in subject and mood. I think some are more successful than others, but I'd really love to hear your (and everyone's) thoughts on them.

Thanks again to everyone who has reviewed - it's wonderful to hear what you all think!

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><p>The student becomes the teacher<p>

Spock could feel the captain's gaze long before Kirk requested a private conference in his office.

Mr. Sulu watched them leave the bridge with apparent, and unnecessary, anxiety. Unless Spock had somehow been remiss in his duties without recognizing it, this conference could not be a matter of concern to anyone.

The door of the captain's office swished closed as Spock moved to stand in front of the desk, hands behind his back.

Jim was apparently still growing accustomed to the power of Captaincy: instead of being seated, he stood perpendicularly to his office's single window, presumably because he felt that the starlines outside set his profile off to an advantage. Spock cocked an eyebrow, but waited in silence.

"Spock, what's going on?" Jim asked at last, turning back and gesturing Spock into a seat.

"I do not understand the query."

"You've been out of it all morning," Jim said, leaning forward in his chair and pointing across the desk. "And don't say you haven't, because I can tell the difference between you thinking and you distracted."

Spock was slightly unnerved by the assertion, but did not alter his expression.

"I do not understand," he repeated. "Have I been remiss in my duties?"

Jim dropped his face into his hands and rubbed his eyes.

"No," he said, voice muffled. "No, you haven't." He looked up with a frown. "If I had wanted to reprimand you for being remiss in your duties, I could've done it on the bridge."

"Certainly." Spock raised an eyebrow. "But I do not believe you would have."

"Spock," Jim said again. "What's going on?"

Spock frowned and lowered his eyes. He did not know when he had become so demonstrative that even Jim Kirk could read his emotions. The idea was far from pleasant. However, Jim was correct in his assessment. Attempting to deny his distraction would be illogical.

"Tomorrow, it will have been precisely one Earth-Year since Lieutenant Uhura and I… initiated our relationship."

The right side of Jim's mouth curved upwards, as did his right eyebrow. "It's your one-year anniversary."

"In Human terms, yes."

Jim's face now bore an expression of inexplicable understanding.

"You forgot," he announced, sounding smug.

Spock felt his annoyance building, and attempted to quell it.

"Vulcans do not forget significant events. Nor do they neglect to note the current date." He shifted his eyes past Jim, who was now grinning broadly, and watched the starlines outside. "It did, however… _slip my mind_… that Humans require celebration to mark such events."

"Ah-HA!" Jim said, leaning back in his chair and spinning slightly from side to side in obvious enjoyment. "So, you don't have anything planned?"

"I do not," Spock agreed, trying to express by his tone and his look that he did not find the situation equally amusing. Jim's face took on a more serious expression.

"Yikes. That _is_ bad."

"Thank you for your assessment."

Jim grinned. Spock had noted that both the captain and the doctor seemed to appreciate his sarcasm in a way that was not particularly intended. It was somewhat confusing, but it did seem to make their interactions in general proceed more smoothly.

Jim seemed now to be musing on the problem at hand. "Pissed off Uhura is…" He trailed off and gave a theatrical shudder.

"A formidable prospect," Spock concluded with a nod.

"Oh, yeah."

Jim began rubbing his chin, his elbow resting lightly on the arm of his chair. It was a pose Spock had seen him practicing recently, presumably to be unveiled on the bridge in the near future.

"_Oh_, yeah," Jim repeated quietly. "Which is why we're all going to help you out."

Spock raised an eyebrow. "Please elaborate."

"When we docked at DS-B5 last week, Bones picked up a case of _excellent_ Bajoran wine, I'm pretty sure Yeoman Dash said something about getting some silk flowers for her quarters, and I bet Scotty could be sweet-talked into getting the replicator to turn out something a bit less… gelatinous than normal."

"You believe I could utilize the purchases and skills of the crew to create an adequate anniversary celebration."

Jim smiled and pointed at him. "Precisely."

Spock contemplated the suggestion. Jim was swinging back and forth in his chair again, all attempts at impressive postures left behind.

"Assuming Dr. McCoy, Yeoman Dash, and Mr. Scott agree to such a course of action –"

"Which they will."

"It is my understanding of Human custom that the preparation of anniversary celebrations are meant to be restricted to the couple in question."

Jim nodded slowly and gazed at the ceiling, seeming to consider. "Yeah," he agreed after a moment.

"In which case, would this not be… cheating?"

Jim grinned. "Good thing you came to the master."


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N:** Once again, thanks for your awesome reviews. You guys make this so much fun. Two this week because they're quite short, and both a bit more experimental than my other prompt shorts. I'd really love to hear your thoughts on these. Con-crit is always very welcome.

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><p>Stranger<p>

She is using the computer in his quarters to check the ship's communications updates when she finds it.

It is hardly anything – a small file with a numerical name offering a stardate roughly fifteen years in the past. She is not sure how she opened it; his computer is personalized differently than hers, and its connections still don't make complete sense.

All she knows is that the file is suddenly open, and she sees a small Vulcan girl, her head turned to the side to display one gracefully tapered ear, her hair elaborately coiled, her mouth stoic but still sweet.

"Spock? What's this?"

He freezes and she already knows.

"That is T'Pring," he says, "the woman to whom I was betrothed as a child."

His voice is calm, but his eyes watch her. He knows enough of Human nature by now to see where danger lies.

Human nature, he understands. Her nature is still a mystery to him.

She wishes she could be predictable in this case. Wishes, almost, for the bitter tang of jealousy in the back of her throat and the pit of her stomach. Wishes she felt something other than the dull ache of loss for this little girl, grown into a woman, dragged into a singularity in the middle of space. This stranger. Spock's wife.

"I had forgotten that file existed," Spock says. "You may delete it."

He moves into the bedroom without another word.

She believes him entirely – knows that, when Vulcan was destroyed, he barely felt the loss of T'Pring amidst the loss of six billion; that he has since missed his mother, his planet, even its other inhabitants, more than T'Pring; that he has probably not thought of her more than once or twice in the past year.

She saves the file, and follows him to bed.


	6. Chapter 6

Prejudice

When the Romulan trader comes aboard, he begins by refusing to speak any language but his own, a very specific subset of the Gol Gathol dialect.

Spock speaks to him in this language. The Romulan observes Spock's stance, his hairstyle, his carefully neutral expression, and turns away. He will speak to someone else.

By the time Uhura arrives in the cargo bay, Kirk is fuming.

"Lieutenant Uhura," he says, his jaw clenched so tightly that he can barely form the words. "Will you tell this gentleman, who clearly understands every word I am saying, that, as representatives of the Federation, we could not be happier to give him every assistance in our power."

Uhura relays the message as politely as she can.

"_Good_," the Romulan trader says in accented Gol Gathol, and Uhura realizes that it is not even his native tongue. "_I did not come aboard an Earther ship to speak to Vulcan whelps_."

Spock's face betrays nothing, but Uhura's must show more than she intended, because Kirk sends Spock out of the room without even asking for a translation. She knows Spock will take this as a criticism, a suggestion that he can't contain his emotions in the face of such offensiveness, but Uhura can understand Kirk's motives, and she will explain them to Spock later, as he tries not to release his fury in the privacy of her quarters: it is easier for both of them to speak diplomatically to this son-of-a-bitch Romulan if they don't have to add insult to injury by doing it in front of Spock.

As Spock leaves the cargo bay, Uhura calms herself by silently calling the Romulan every Klingon curse word in her arsenal. They are guttural, savage, and satisfying. They are not enough.

The Romulan's small shuttle requires multiple external and mechanical repairs before it is capable of flight. Kirk tells Scotty to make the repairs his first priority. He orders a security detail placed on the Romulan at all times. When the Romulan complains, Kirk informs him, with his best go-to-hell smile, "I apologize for the inconvenience, but in light of recent events, Federation regulations require me to treat all individuals potentially associated with the war criminal Nero as security threats. You understand, sir, that I am just trying to protect my crew."

Uhura translates the message with immense satisfaction.

When at last the Romulan vessel is space-ready, Uhura and Kirk escort the trader to his craft in the cargo bay. He bids them both a polite farewell, and Uhura finally says what she's been wanting to all week.

"_Sir, I say this not as a representative of the Federation, but as an individual who saw the destruction of Vulcan. I understand that the history between your races has been fraught, but after such a tragedy, why can't past differences be put aside in favor of peace?_"

The Romulan looks down at her, his eyes as dark as Spock's beneath his slanted brows. After a moment, he gives her an almost sad smile.

"_You just wait and see what they do to get us back._"


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N:** This is the last of the Trek fic I've written at the moment, and my own personal favorite of my prompt pieces. Thank you all so much for your reviews and support; it's been wonderful to hear your thoughts. I don't have any further Trek fic in the offing at the moment, but it's rare that I don't return to a fandom, so hopefully I'll write more eventually. In the meantime, thank you for reading! I hope you enjoy this piece.

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><p>Moonlight<p>

"They're beautiful."

Spock followed Nyota's gaze upwards, towards Beylix's night sky.

Work on the nearby Vulcan colony had ceased with the setting of the sun. The air had grown cool, but the yellow, rocky ground still held a surprising amount of warmth. The night was clear, and the sky was dominated by the planet's twin moons, vast and pale green, and glowing so brightly that they almost washed out the stars.

"You are referring to Beylix I and II," he said, examining the moons.

"Yes."

Spock shook his head. "Most of the colonists dislike them."

Nyota looked at him, head cocked in a very Vulcan expression of confusion.

"Why?"

"Vulcan had no moon," he explained, smiling at her unintentional mimicry. "To have such large satellites in the night sky is… unfamiliar to us."

Nyota was silent as she looked upwards again.

Spock observed that the moons cast a faintly greenish light on the surrounding terrain, almost as if the new irrigation networks had already taken hold. Behind them, in the growing city, he could hear the soft hiss of mechanic decompression from various drills and diggers and cranes.

"Have you heard the Chinese legend of Chang-O?" Nyota asked him at last.

"I do not believe so."

Nyota leaned back on her hands and tilted her face upwards. Her hair, unbound since the cessation of work, hung behind her like a curtain, although some locks still clung to her shoulders. Her skin was bright with green moonlight.

"Once upon a time," she began, and Spock recognized with surprise the distant echo of tales his mother had told him when he was very young, before he had informed her that he no longer required bedtime stories.

"There was a woman named Chang-O. She was very beautiful and clever, but she was also very inquisitive. Her husband, Hou Yi, was a gifted marksman. With his arrows, he could bring down any foe."

Spock wondered if Nyota realized that her speech patterns had changed. Her almost singsong inflection was another echo from another time, another planet, another woman. The recognition was painful, but he found, upon inspection, that he did not wish for her to cease.

"One day, the Emperor called on Hou Yi to use his abilities to protect mankind. Hou Yi succeeded, and the Emperor rewarded him with the Elixir of Everlasting Life. He warned Hou Yi that he must prepare himself for immortality with one year of fasting and prayer.

"Hou Yi hid the Elixir in his home. When he went away again, Chang-O found it, and its light and beauty made her so curious that she decided to swallow it."

Nyota smiled at him and lay back on the blanket they had brought with them, tugging gently on his arm. He lay down beside her, tilting his face towards hers as she continued to watch the moons.

"Her husband returned home and began to scold her for being too curious, but Chang-O flew out the window and into the sky. Hou Yi chased her halfway across the heavens before the wind forced him to return home to Earth. But Chang-O landed on the Moon, and couldn't get back down.

"So Hou Yi built himself a palace on the sun, and once a year, he can visit his wife on the Moon. On that day, the Moon is bright and full."

She looked at him from the corners of her eyes before turning her face towards his.

Spock had many observations about the nature of the legend, but as Nyota twined her fingers through his, he found that there was only one that he wished to make.

"It is a lovely story."

Nyota smiled and shifted closer to him, her body curled towards his. "My Grandmother told it to me when I was a little girl. She heard it while she was gathering folktales for the Human Legacy Project. I used to sit out on the balcony of our apartment and look at the moon, and pretend to tell Chang-O about…" she shrugged one shoulder and turned her eyes towards the moons "…about all the things I thought she'd understand. Curiosity. The unknown." She looked back at him with a teasing grin. "Men."

Spock smiled softly before he turned his face away from her, back towards the sky.

Perhaps Beylix's moons seemed ominous only because they had no symbolic associations. It was illogical to assign emotional value to such impersonal objects, yet Vulcans had legends and they had religion. Vulcan itself had had several creation myths. None of them were perceived as fact, of course; like all planets, Vulcan's origins were purely scientific. However, such myths could be beneficial in other ways.

"We Vulcans must adapt to our new planet," he said aloud. "Perhaps we should develop our own legends about our moons."

They were both silent for a moment.

Nyota raised their joined hands to her mouth and slowly, gently, kissed each of his fingers. He watched her lips graze his knuckles, her eyes lowered, her skin soft and cool. She drew herself against his side, her body shifting to accommodate his, her face tilted into the hollow of his neck.

"Once upon a time," she whispered, and her breath sent shivers over his skin, "there were two brothers. Although they had an entire planet to themselves, they always fought. They fought because…?"

She trailed off, and he waited for her to continue. When she did not, he tilted his head carefully to look down at her, and found her watching him, her eyebrows raised in an expression of expectation.

Spock was about to protest that he did not know how such stories were meant to proceed. However, as he turned his face back to the moons, he found himself answering her beginning.

"One brother was unfailingly logical," he intoned, attempting to recreate her inflection. "The other was ruled by passion and need."

He could hear the smile in her voice as she took up the story again. "The logical brother said…"

The words came more easily this time.

"'It is logical for us to divide this planet equally. Then we will have no cause to fight between ourselves.'"

"But the passionate brother said…"

Spock shifted onto his side, his body curved towards hers. He caressed her hand, still joined with his, and touched his forehead to hers.

"'I must have the entire planet to myself. I cannot share it.'"

Nyota moved her other hand to the side of his face, tracing his jaw and cheekbone with her thumb before curling her palm against the side of his neck, burying her fingertips in his hair. He closed his eyes and let his body relax under her touch.

"They fought until their weapons were destroyed," she murmured. "And then they fought with their hands. Finally, the passionate brother threw his logical twin into the sky."

She shifted closer and kissed the corner of his mouth.

"But the passionate brother realized that he could not live without his other half. Distraught, he followed his brother into the heavens. Now they hang in the sky forever, looking down on the planet they share."

Spock opened his eyes to gaze at her, fascinated by the beauty of her face, the curve of her eyelids, the swell of her lips; amazed that she could fit into him so well, and yet still be beside him, outside of himself, complete and completing, touching and touched.

"It is a good legend for Vulcans," he murmured at last.

She smiled, carving new shadows into the green light on her face.

"Yes," she said. "I think it is."


End file.
